The Northern Guilford Nighthawks, led by former Lancaster High School head football coach Johnny Roscoe, will be shooting for the N.C. High School Athletic Association 3-AA state championship Saturday night at 7 in N.C. State’s Carter-Finley Stadium.

Chief Craig Roof of the Charlotte Road/Van Wyck Volunteer Fire Department remembers Dillon Denton as a man who was always willing to help.
Denton, a volunteer fire lieutenant with the department, died Tuesday morning after suffering a brain aneurysm. He was 64.
Roof knew Denton for more than three years, and served as his chief for the last year. He said Denton was someone he could count on when he needed a hand.

A Lancaster woman was hit in the head with a brick during an altercation with another woman late last week.
The victim, a 32-year-old Pageland Highway resident, told police that she got into an argument with a woman Friday morning at a Pleasant Hill Street home.
The accused attacked, Rachel Stewart, 47, told police that she punched the woman in the back of the head after the two argued, according to a Lancaster Police Department incident report.
Stewart, of 1900 Springdale Road, Lancaster, was charged Friday with aggravated assault and battery.

American essayist Hamilton Wright Mabie once said of Christmas, “Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love.”
With the Christmas season upon us, there are several such conspiracies afoot in Lancaster County, all of them aimed at bringing joy to struggling families.
And this year, there’s a lot of people struggling, organizers say – more than any time in their recent memory.

Eric Montgomery spent most of Tuesday cleaning up the remnants of a building he owned on Great Falls Highway.
Sifting through the rubble, Montgomery stopped to pick out shards of window glass and pieces of steel from the frame. He said the auto body shop building at 1981 Great Falls Highway was a complete loss after a fire burned it down on Monday. He had rented it to two tenants.
“Shoot, it’s flat on the ground,” Montgomery said. “We’re just out here today (Tuesday) cleaning it all up.”

The Lancaster County Sheriff’s Office is looking for five men in two armed robberies that occurred during the last week.
The first robbery occurred Dec. 1 at the Stop-N-Shop at 2147 McIlwain Road.
At about 9:40 p.m. that day, three men armed with handguns entered the store and demanded cash from employees, according to a sheriff’s office press release.

Dan Jackson doesn’t understand the need for an Indian Land Fire Protection District.
Jackson, a Charlotte Highway resident whose family has lived in the same area for more than 150 years, told Lancaster County Council last week he was worried about the idea of creating a unified district.
“I haven’t been one way or another about big companies coming in here,” Jackson said. “But if we pack more people in here, there’s more of a chance of fires.”